“Alarmed is the right word. I nearly called 911 before I left the house. I’m glad I didn’t.”
“Me too! Can you imagine how embarrassing that would be, them showing up because I couldn’t get a box through a doorway.”
Alice shook her head, and then pinned her gaze on the carton.
“Okay, girlfriend. The question of the day: What’s in the box?”
Annie shook her head.
“I have not the least little clue. It’s something LeeAnn sent.” She glanced at her watch. “Guess I’ll open it when I get back home.”
Alice squawked.
“You will do no such thing! You think I can sit quietly and do cross-stitch for an hour or two when I’m dying of curiosity? Open it, Annie.” She grinned and added, “Please?”
Annie hesitated, but only for a moment. Whether or not she showed it, she was more curious than Alice.
“I’ll just go get something to cut through this strapping tape.”
She rummaged around in her “everything” drawer in the kitchen, pushing aside a set of keys, three blue pens, a couple of screwdrivers, a roll of tape and half a package of gum before she finally laid her hands on the sharp utility knife she was searching for. Alice clapped her hands when Annie returned to the living room, brandishing the knife.
“It’s just like Christmas,” Alice sang out.
“Isn’t it?” They giggled like two little girls.
Annie thrust the tip of the knife into the corded tape and ran it slowly, gently along the top of one side of the box. Alice watched, fidgeting.
“Will you hurry? What are you doing?” she finally asked, impatience coloring her tone. “At this rate we will be here all day.” She bent to examine the tape, then shook her head sadly. “Look at that, Annie. You didn’t even cut it all the way through.”
“Well, I don’t want to damage whatever’s inside. What if it’s full of balloons, or something?”
“Balloons? Oh, Annie!”
“Well, you know what I mean. The box might contain something delicate or breakable. I don’t want to nick anything.”
“I’m sure your daughter packed it carefully. Go for it!”
Annie hesitated just a moment longer. Finally, she forced herself to banish the image of hideous knife marks gouged into the contents, whatever they were.
“Well, then,” she said, and pulled the knife through the tape with considerable less delicacy the second time. She guided the blade around the sealed path until all four box flaps were free to be pulled back.
“Now, my friend,” she intoned as dramatically as a Shakespearean actor, “we shall see what we shall see!”
Alice leaned forward, smiling, bright eyes sparkling with eagerness and curiosity.
Annie pushed back the flaps. She gasped and took a half a step back when she saw the gift.
“Oh, my goodness! Alice, look. Would you look at that!”
Both women stared wide-eyed at skein after skein of yarn that filled the box almost to overflowing. Annie thrust her hands into the contents with the eagerness of a little kid on Christmas morning, and pulled out armfuls of soft baby yarns in every pastel shade. She lifted out dark durable wools, bright practical cottons and easy-to-use blends variegated in so many shades it staggered her mind.
“Look!” she whispered again, as if afraid Santa Claus would overhear and take the gift back up the chimney. “Oh, Alice, look at this!”
“I’m looking, I’m looking! I have never seen so much yarn in one place in my whole life. Except at A Stitch in Time, of course.”
As the women continued to take out the yarn, they discovered at least twenty balls of crochet thread, some of it sturdy as twine and some of it felt as delicate as a spider’s web.
“My goodness, Annie. What a treasure trove!”
“Oh, isn’t it?”
Halfway immersed in the box, Annie found a second package.
“There’s something else!” she shouted as she came up for air.
Alice laughed. “This obviously is the gift that keeps on giving.”
“It surely seems that way, doesn’t it? Now, what’s in here?”
She yanked the brown wrapping off the second package and found it contained at least a dozen crochet pattern books. Accompanying the books was a sealed envelope with the word “Mom” written in large letters across the front.
Annie thrust the books into Alice’s hands, grabbed up the letter eagerly and tore open the flap. She silently read the brief note.
“Well? That’s a letter from LeeAnn, isn’t it?” Alice asked. “What’s it say?”
Annie smiled and read aloud. “Dear Mom, Things are going well here, hectic as usual. The twins put all their red and brown crayons in the toaster oven. Don’t ask me why. What a mess, though!
“Herb is getting over a nasty cold. He actually missed a day of work last week, but he’s feeling much better now. Hope you continue to avoid catching any ‘bugs’ this year. I’d hate to think of you up there, all by yourself, and sick with a cold.”
Annie paused reading long enough to chuckle and say to Alice, “Can you just imagine how much chicken soup the Hook and Needle women would provide if I were to become ill?”
Alice laughed with her. “Gallons!” she said.
Annie continued to read. “Yarns Galore here in Dallas had a going out-of-business sale this week. I couldn’t resist buying some crochet goods for you. Please think of me as you use this yarn. Hope you enjoy it! I miss you so much and love you even more! Hugs and kisses from J & J. Love, LeeAnn.”
With her eyes swimming, Annie looked up and smiled at Alice.
“Of course I’ll think of her when I use this yarn. I think of her, every day. I think of them all every day.”
“Oh, Annie,” Alice said softly. “I know you miss them.”
The smile Alice gave her brought more tears to Annie’s eyes, but she refused to give in to any melancholy, especially when she would be meeting with her friends very soon. She flicked the tears away with her fingertips and took a deep breath.
“You know what?” she said, glancing at her watch. “We’re going to be late for the meeting, and we both look like we’ve been working in a barn.”
Alice laughed and headed for the door. “As long as we don’t smell like we’ve been working in a barn, I’m happy! And you know, I seem to be late more often than not these days,” she said as she went outside. “See you soon, Annie.”
After Alice left, Annie realized she had not even thanked her dear childhood friend for helping.
2
“What happened to you?” Peggy Carson called out the minute Annie entered the comforting, dry warmth of A Stitch in Time.
Annie was breathless, wet and cold. She held her tote bag clutched close to her chest to keep her crochet project dry. She resisted the urge to shake all over like a wet dog.
Annie felt a little disconnected from the present moment. She had taken a few minutes before she left Grey Gables to call LeeAnn, and now their conversation lingered in her mind, soft and bittersweet.
“Honey, this box of yarn you sent is the most generous and thoughtful gift anyone could have given me,” she had said almost as soon as LeeAnn answered the phone.
“I’m so glad you like it, Mom.”
Annie could almost see the smile on her daughter’s face.
“Mom?”
Annie heard wistfulness replace the smile a moment later.
“Yes, honey? What is it?”
“I guess this will sound a little silly, but sometimes, especially lately it seems, right before I go to sleep at night, I have this memory. It is so crystal clear that it’s like it is really happening.”
“It must be a very special memory, then. What is it?”
“Well, it’s something I remember from when I was a little girl. It’s bedtime, and I’m in my pajamas, and I go into the room to give you a good-night kiss. I see you sitting in your favorite chair, that soft rose-pink one that used to belong to Gra
ndma. Daddy is usually in the recliner with his feet up, and he’s reading or dozing. A cup of tea sits on the table next to you, and your head is bent over hook and yarn. In my memory, there is always music playing, and you always have a little smile on your face as if you’re just so happy.”
Tears stung Annie’s eyes. She knew that memory; she thought of it often as LeeAnn grew up and no longer kissed her good night every night. This memory rubbed a wound in her heart. She missed her family so much!
“That happened nearly every night, honey,” she said with forced light-heartedness, “until you got too old for such mush.”
LeeAnn laughed. “Mush. I forgot that word.”
“LeeAnn,” Annie said, trying to banish the blue mood that seemed to be growing, “do you remember when you would read the crochet pattern directions to me phonetically. Ch 1, sk next ch-3 sp. All those little bits of words spurting like drops of water. It was so funny. We would laugh so hard that you would finally have to stop reading just so you could breathe.”
“I remember! I loved doing that.”
They laughed together again for a moment, and then the laughter faded.
“Mom?” Annie heard the pensiveness in her daughter’s voice again. “I’m not trying to be all somber and mopey-sounding, but I’ve been wondering … with your new life and all your new friends, do you … well, I mean, you do still miss us? Don’t you?”
LeeAnn’s need for reassurance played Annie’s heartstrings, striking twin chords of sympathy and full understanding.
“Oh, honey, yes!” she rushed to assure the younger woman. “More than you know. How could I not? You and Herb, and the twins … you are my dear family. Listen to me. This is important: I will never make so many friends or have so much to do that I will stop missing y’all every day. Never!”
LeeAnn’s chuckle was a little watery.
“I guess I sound like a spoiled brat, don’t I?” she asked.
“No! Not at all.”
“I just wanted to hear you tell me again.” Annie heard her inhale deeply and blow out the breath. “Mom, I just wish we had spent more time together while you were still living down here.”
Annie wished that too. In fact, she had wished it often even while she still lived near LeeAnn. But her daughter had her own busy life, full of babies and friends and work. More often than not, Annie had felt she was unnecessary, perhaps even somewhat underfoot at times. Too bad it had taken Annie’s absence to prove LeeAnn’s devotion.
“Well, don’t think about that, honey. Just be sure you spend lots of time with your own kids and with Herb. Don’t you ever doubt, not even for a fraction of a minute, that your mama misses you terribly.”
“Okay, Mom. I’ll try. And don’t you forget that you’re coming down for a visit in the fall. Right?”
“Right. If all goes according to plan.”
“Then we’ll just have to be patient until we see each other again, won’t we?”
“Yes,” Annie sighed. “We surely will.”
And she would, tough as it was to wait. LeeAnn’s words had pricked an old scar in the melancholy mood Annie had battled for the last several days. She was determined not to fall prey to more gloomy meanderings. For now, it was enough that she had her projects, and she had her friends, and right then, those friends were sitting a few feet away, looking at her, waiting for Annie to greet them.
Giving a smile to the group in general, she set the tote on the floor next to her, shed her raincoat and hung it on the coatrack that Mary Beth Brock, the shop’s owner, had provided for the members of the club. She fluffed her chin-length blond hair with her fingers, glanced down at her burgundy blouse to make sure she was buttoned and straight, and then looked around the cozy group and retrieved the tote.
“Good morning, all,” she said as she settled into her chair. From the bag, she pulled out her current work-in-progress, an ecru pineapple table runner. It would match the two place mats she had already completed.
She had been so used to working with worsted yarn that when she began this project, the delicate cotton thread felt strange and thin in her fingers. At first she had taken out as many stitches as she made until she finally grew accustomed to the small hook and slender thread. Lately, though, as she worked, the silver hook flew from stitch to stitch as fast as the larger ones did when she crocheted afghans and throws.
The door opened, letting in damp air and the constant sound of rain as it battered the sidewalk and street. Alice burst into the shop, gave everyone a distracted glance and let the door close behind her.
“Does anyone know where the phrase ‘raining cats and dogs’ comes from?” she asked the group. She slicked drops from her denim jacket and jeans and slid her booted feet across the small mat at the entryway.
The women exchanged mystified looks, and in nearly perfect unison, they said, “No.”
“I’ve never even thought about it,” Peggy added. Slightly chubby, with short dark hair, Peggy gave the world the impression of fun and enthusiasm. Her pink and white uniform offered a spot of cheerful color on such a rainy day. Peggy obviously would be working at The Cup & Saucer later that afternoon. “I take it you know the answer, Alice?”
“As I was driving here, the fellow on the radio said he had looked it up on the Internet and found that, in all likelihood, it came from seventeenth century England when a lot of rain would flush out debris and among it would be dead dogs and cats—and other things too disgusting to mention—that would go floating by.”
“Oh, Alice, that is truly revolting!” dark-haired Kate Stevens said, looking up from the counter where she was straightening a rack of novelty buttons. Everyone agreed with her.
“Well,” Alice sniffed as she settled into her chair, “I just wanted all of you to know that it is not raining cats and dogs … yet.” She glanced around. “Where’s Gwendolyn?”
The words were barely out of her mouth when the door opened again. Gwendolyn Palmer, every inch Stony Point’s leader in fashion and style, greeted the others.
“So sorry I’m late. The rain is just terrible!” She removed a tailored sea-green raincoat and hung it on the rack with everyone else’s jackets or coats. A matching, wide-brimmed hat sat saucily atop her head. When she took it off, her short blond hair looked as chic as ever. One thing about Gwendolyn, she always looked perfectly put together every time Annie had seen her.
Gwen settled down and plucked up her knitting from a forest green tote.
“My goodness,” she said, looking at the half-finished chocolate brown sweater she held up for display. “Here it is April already, and I had planned to have this done in February. Well, John has waited all this time, so I guess he can wait a little longer and wear it next winter.”
The group shared a chuckle, but they realized a woman as busy as Gwen did not always sit down and knit. She always seemed to be busy in civic affairs around Stony Point. Annie liked the woman and was glad Gwen rarely missed the weekly Hook and Needle Club meetings.
“I hope to have this wall hanging finished by the end of the month,” Peggy said. She gazed down at the quilting project on her lap. The pattern was a lush green palm leaf on a pale blue background—simple but refined. Her tiny neat stitches added to the overall elegance of the piece, and anyone who looked at it could see the love Peggy had for her work.
From her gray-and-red plaid tote, Alice lifted out the cross-stitch covering she was making for a miniature picture frame. It was to be a gift for a cousin in New Hampshire who was expecting a baby at the end of May. The tiny yellow and white design seemed to herald springtime and new life.
“I just love that,” Annie sighed, looking at Alice’s neat handiwork. “It’s like you’re holding a bit of sunshine in your hands.”
“Thanks, Annie,” Alice said, smiling. “And your project is terrific! I love it more every time I see it. I can’t wait to see it spread out on your dining table some evening, with Betsy’s Aster Blue china, and her crystal goblets, with candlelight flickerin
g. … ”
Annie smiled and said nothing. The notion was too romantic for her palate right then. Somehow romance just was not on her list of priorities since Wayne passed away.
My dear husband! Now he was a romantic guy, she thought silently, full of tender surprises.
Then she realized she was doing it again, allowing herself to fall into the glum clutches of gray, rainy days that looked as if they would never end.
With determination, Annie shoved aside sadness and concentrated on the delicate lacy work in her hands. She planned to give the runner and place mats to Alice for her birthday a few weeks from now.
“Ladies, may I have your attention so we can discuss our next group project?” Mary Beth said, standing in the center where they could all see her.
In her blue slacks and matching sweater, Mary Beth’s stocky build and her kind but firm voice gave the woman an air of comfortable authority, like a well-liked teacher. The silvery threads of gray running through her dark hair caught the light from the overhead fixtures as she looked at the group.
“The other day I was visiting with one of the women who works at the Seaside Hills Assisted Living,” she said, “and she told me she had overheard a few of the resident ladies talking. She said the women were saying how much they wished they had footwear that was softer than their usual house slippers but warmer than the socks that are available in stores. Well, that got me to thinking, and I wondered why couldn’t we, the Hook and Needle Club, make slippers for those residents?”
She turned first to curly-haired Peggy.
“You could make quilted ones, couldn’t you, Peggy, and Alice could add cross-stitch along the sides or top. And Stella, I’m sure you can knit slippers, right? Gwen, you just said you were not going to force John to wear that sweater until autumn.” Everyone laughed, and she added, “I’m sure Annie and Kate can whip out a few pairs of slippers with their crochet hooks.”
“That sounds like a great idea!” Kate said, fairly bouncing with enthusiasm. “I have a good pattern for some really cute slippers. It’s pretty simple so it won’t take very long to crochet several pairs.”
The Deed in the Attic Page 2